My handcrafted jewelry blog featuring everything from unusual bracelets to chandelier earrings. The jewelry I make can be seen at www.clunygreyjewelry.com or at www.leslieturtlejewelry.com. A world of gemstones awaits!

Sunday, March 24, 2013

The mixed colors of tourmaline are always in style; here the two strand tourmaline necklace is truly seasonless. The necklace has tourmalines in all shapes and sizes from smooth opaque nuggets to translucent rondelles to gem-quality tourmalines. Sterling silver accents the many colors and a special gemstone clasp holds it all together! Below, I've become really enamoured of apatite, especially the neon turquoise color that you see here in this apatite and mixed gemstone bracelet. Gem quality amethysts are beautiful with the apatite, but the unusual addition is that of genuine opals from Australia. 14 karat gold-filled components show off the beauty of the gemstones, and 14 karat gold-filled sand-dollar charm adds a whimsical touch.

Above and below, this chalcedony necklace will mix with most of your chalcedony jewelry since it boasts wonderful spring colors of aqua, light green, purple, pink and yellow. The purple gemstones are large faceted slabs of amethysts; the small faceted yellow olive gemstones are lemon quartz. Tiny accents of sterling silver are between each of the gemstones and a sterling silver clasp is the closure.

Monday, August 24, 2009

Today had a coolness in the air despite the bright sunshine; a portent of Fall. And I'm working on the Cluny Grey Fall Collection still! Remember that I will start posting from the Fall Collection on Labor Day. Meanwhile, here are some bracelets that haven't made it to the website yet, and that I will price in the next two days. If you want to know when these are available to buy, go to the end of this post and sign up for my Twitter feed. I don't tell you when I'm having coffee - or really much of anything except when I've made a new bracelet or other piece of jewelry and/or posted it on the website so that it is ready to purchase. I didn't see the point of Twitter personally until I realized that I could use it to announce each new piece that I made for those customers who want to see what's new, but don't have time to scan 100+ pages of theCluny Grey Jewelrywebsite. And several times people have called me or e-mailed me to reserve something that they had seen here on the blog before I got it posted. So this gives you first chance at finding the perfect piece to complement your wardrobe! Today's offerings (these have not been priced on the website yet, but I will tweet when I price them): the first two bracelets are both predominantly sapphire and will be found on the Sapphire Bracelets page. The first bracelet features a large pink chalcedony nugget and a borosilicate lampwork bead. The second bracelet is from the Raj Collection and has genuine rubies and 14k goldfilled accents.. Directly above are twoAquamarine Bracelets. Aquamarines surround a flat smooth rectangle of fire agate in the top bracelet, all accented with vermeil ; in the bottom one, faceted aquamarine nuggets are punctuated by a single nugget of amethyst. The accents here are sterling silver. The last bracelet on the page is made of tourmalines - two strands of varying sizes ranging from smooth nuggets to small faceted hearts. You will be able to find it on theTourmaline Bracelets page.SIGN UP HERE TO follow me on Twitter

Tuesday, March 25, 2008

If I get any busier I'm going to have to clone myself! Nevertheless, I decided it was time to update the blog and try to get a few things on the website. Some time ago I bought quite a few tourmaline strands; some of them turned out to be very pretty. Pretty tourmaline can be difficult to find in bead form. How I wish I'd bought strands and strands of it when I was in India! But now I have to try to search and search like everyone else. I saw great tourmaline when I was in India; appropriate, since Sri Lanki gave tourmaline its name and (tur mali in Sinhalese) the Dutch East India Company (headquartered in Madras where I spent most of my time; Sri Lanka is right off the coast) brought tourmalines back to Europe.Nowadays, tourmaline comes from Brazil (deep blue-green paraiba tourmaline is prized), Namibia, Mozambique, Nigeria, Pakistan, and Afghanistan. Tourmaline is even found in the USA.What I love about tourmalines is what they are known for - their many colours, even within a single crystal. One old legend has it that in coming up from the earth, the tourmaline somehow passed over an underground rainbow and absorbed its varied colours.Many people are fond of pink tourmaline, and it has been accepted as an alternate birthstone for the month of October (usual birthstone is the opal). I like to use all the colours of tourmaline together in one piece of jewelry. This works for me because, first, it is rare to get enough perfect tourmaline in one colour for a piece of jewelry, and second, because I like the way the colours blend together.I particularly like clear olive, pink, and yellow tourmaline. And these three shades are wonderful together.The jewelry on this page is representative of the tourmalines I get: the top pair oftourmaline earrings illustrate the different colours of green and pink; the second pair, here in the last picture, show blends of pink although without the green that makes "watermelon" tourmaline - very popular recently. Thetourmaline necklaceabove has colours of tourmalines ranging from black to watermelon to green to pink and all shades in between. Tourmaline jewelry is also very useful in the jewelry wardrobe since it can go with so many different clothes.

Cluny Grey Jewelry

About Me

I am: Donna Morris, Donna Karber, Donna Cluny Gardner - in each phase of my life people have known me by different names. I definitely have changed as my name has changed however! Former English and Humanties teacher.